Incorrigible Kickass Riffage - 100%

While it's not precisely a mystery to me why this guys are not as praised and well known as they deserve, it's still a pity that the lyrical content detract the overall experience of Arghoslent.

Arghoslent performs a unique brand of melodic death metal that has nothing on the swedish style most people knows. The songs are fast, relentless and quite upbeat; in fact they have a very military feeling that it's more encouraging than anything else, like war songs to prepare warriors for battle, a quite fitting feeling for the lyrics.

The most impressive feature of Arghoslent is the riffing. It's incredible how good, diverse and yet consistent is the songwriting and how crushing and memorable are each and every single riff on Incorrigible Bigotry. The riffs are not the typical brutal downtuned muted chugging, instead you can notice how they effectively blend heavy metal riffing in a death metal context. I also recognize some 'hellenic' black metal influence on their harmonic and some melodic approach (this gets more evident on their next effort Hornets of the Pogrom) and even the production values emphatize this heavy metal feeling more than an oppressive and 'brutal' wall of sound. For some, the album might feel too 'light' for being death metal but I think this is one of their greatest achievements and decisions: to make everything crystal clear to make shine even more the riffs.

Right off the bat, 'Flogging the Cargo' smashs your face with frantic riffing, ponderous drumming and hateful vocals, greatly performed. The lyrics are quite offensive, but the vocals are so well provided that you CAN'T avoid to sing along with them. I've never thought I would be growling loudly things like 'Exotic filthy mongrel dogs, Fettered to failure by a flawed genome', but I do. The Purging Fires of War features a more epic and majestic feeling with lyrics not so far from Bathory's Hammerheart, providing a good change of pace for what's about to come.

What about 'Quelling the Simian Surge'? sounds offensive, but the riffs and overall pace are so fucking awesome that even my black friends bang their heads against the wall with it. How can you stop yourself from screaming your lungs out with 'ON SWEATING BAAACKS OF NIGGER SLAAAVES!!' I can't. I do it every single time I put play to this song; hell, I've even made it just walking on the street! It's so catchy, so awesomely written that it forces you to growl it, no matter what, how or where you are. Also, this song features a slow interlude that could be easily heard on an early Varathron or Necromantia forgotten demo. Not just they have the catchiness and frantic feeling that compells you to destroy your neck banging your head, but also they manage to bring a strong sense of pride and epicness, everything flowing so naturally and coherently.

The rest of the album goes like that; riff upon riff you simply don't feel they would ever slow down at quality providing both a consistent feeling thru the album and unique and memorable moments in each track; they even have an 8 and half minute instrumental track that doesn't bores you at all. The last track called 'Hereditary Taint', features on their very first section one of the best riffs I've heard on my life. That section just before the vocals kicks in it's like a microcosmos of flawless riffage diversity. It's melodic, it's powerful, it feels like the perfect combination of NWOBHM, death and black metal. The drum beats also helps a lot to the engaging effect, flawlessly combining catchy double bass patterns with blasts, enhancing the aggressiveness of the song.

The only reason I think people might pass over this album is for the lyrical content. I have no problems with the lyrics and, while I don't share his fixation on looking down people for being slaves, I think they are the best 'racist' lyric writers from the metal scene. They mostly relate historical events that happen to feature slaves, and since they truly hate people submitted, they just trash them for their weakness. I'm aware that they hate gays, tramps and such, but I simply don't care cause they write incredible musical pieces.

If you don't feel personally offended by their lyrics (in a way that distract you from the enjoyment of the music), you must have this album.